Scripture
Psalm 43: 3
O send out your light and your truth;
let them lead me;
let them bring me to your holy hill
and to your dwelling.
1Corinthians 13: 1 - 4
If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Reflection
I have been thinking lately about this world that we currently exist in. Well it is more a wondering, or a contemplating, as I have struggled this last little while with everything that is going on around the globe. But, then we come to today, Valentine’s Day a day when we are told that we are to celebrate love. I have wondered what does it meant to celebrate love in the midst of such darkness in the world. It is even appropriate to speak of such things in a world that is so filled with anger and violence. So, let me be completely honest here, I am not immune to the anger of the world, it has at times affected how I have interacted with the world around me and I have struggled with my own reactions to the darkness of this world.
We speak a lot about love in the church. We speak of how we are called to love, even those who hate us. Yet, I think that we all know how difficult that can be. J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Hobbit and The Lord of The Rings, wrote, “ The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingles with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.” Even though Tolkien might have been talking about the world of Middle Earth, this quote speaks to our world as well. It speaks to the reality that we live in a world that can be very dark, but it also speaks to something more. This quote speaks to another reality and that is the same reality that is reflected in the scriptures that I chose today. It is the reality that even in the midst of darkness we are called to be people of love. We are called to see the light of love in the darkest of times, not just when everything is good. The Psalmist speaks to the desire to see God’s light in the darkness and for the light to lead them forward. Paul in the letter to Corinth speaks to our need to be those who bring that light, that love, to what we for the power of love is the power that will allow us to endure, hope, and believe that even in the midst of darkness there is still some goodness, some light. Tolkien then builds on this as he speaks to the fact that even in grief love exists and sometimes through the experience of grief our love grows ever stronger. It is a challenge for us as Christians, it is a challenge for us on the Valentine’s Day, to not reduce the idea of love to romanticized version of love, but rather to see love as that which will bring light to the darkness of the world. It is our challenge to see beyond what we know of the world to something more.
I am sure that there are many who, when reading this, will say that this is ‘all well and good, but it is not that easy!’ I couldn’t agree more, it is difficult but if we understand God to be Love then we must rely on God for the help that we need in order to love, as we are called to love in this world. Sarah Speed wrote a poem for today, which I would like to share with you:
Tune My Heart
Tune my heart.
Like an old violin,
like a worn down piano,
I have been left out in all manner of weather;
I have been left alone for far too long.
So like a concertmaster
with a steady hand,
tune me up.
Listen and learn
the cracked keys,
the broken strings.
Memorize the forgotten intervals
that even I did not know.
And then, when we’re ready,
When this creaky heart is tuned,
teach me a new song.
To love in this world today, to really love in this world today, I believe that we need to reach out too God to teach us a new song. It is a song that will help us to love in the midst of darkness. It is a song that will bring light in the midst of darkness. It is love, the chance for us to bring God’s love to this world. That, I believe, is who and what we are called to do.
Prayer
God of Expansive Love, shine the light of your love into our lives so that we might be bearers of that light to a world that lives in darkness. Give us the courage to truly love in a world where it is too easy for anger to take hold. Give us the wisdom to know that it is only through love that we might truly change the world. We ask this in the name of Love Incarnate, your son, Jesus. Amen